These men and their henchmen grew rich selling
Prohibition liquor from Canada or heroin during the Vietnam War. They took over
cities, Chicago or Manhattan, by bribing police, aldermen, even judges.
Often, outlaws were immortalized and ‘goodfellas’ were
glamorized. Clyde Barrow and Bonnie Parker held up gas stations and banks,
killing twelve people in the process. A former Texas Ranger, Frank Hamer, had
to follow them across nine states before ending their reign in a Louisiana
ambush. In such cases, the good guys got justice, while the goodfellas just got
dead.
Frank Lucas served time for distributing narcotics,
and his stash of two hundred and fifty million dollars was confiscated. Later,
he helped convict three-quarters of Manhattan’s Drug Enforcement Agency.
But when a gangster from Harlem, Henry Hill, was
arrested for cocaine trafficking, he ratted out the Mafia before entering the
Federal Witness Protection Program where, rumor has it, he is living a life of
luxury.
Is this proof that crime does not pay, but living on
the government’s dime does?
